Seasonal changes in Carbohydrate, Lipid and Protein content in emerging worker honeybees and their mortality

Seasonal changes in Carbohydrate, Lipid and Protein content in emerging worker honeybees and their mortality

Author(s)

Karl Kunert And Karl Crailsheim

Abstract

In healthy, well-provisioned colonies, natural changes of workers' larval food did not significantly influence average lifespan of bees in summer. In newly emerged bees, deviations in weight and protein content, fat and glycogen were investigated continuously during most of the breeding season in hives kept under similar conditions. Weight and protein content were dependent on season and availability of food outside the hive. Different protein contents of groups of emerging bees in summer could not be correlated with average lifespan. Newly emerged bees that survived to the winter season had greater dry weights, protein, triglycerides, fats, glucose and glycogen than spring or summer bees that did not survive into the winter.